Baldur's Gate Ultimate Collection (1+2 and Expansions)

This is the ultimate collection of one of the finest games ever made. Baldur's Gate is part 1 of the trilogy, while BG2 and its expansion form parts 2 and 3.

Gameplay: this is the best existing incarnation of Dungeons and Dragons rules. Other games using D&D rules are either focused only on combat (Icewind Dale, Temple of Elemental Evil), far too restrictive on party size (Neverwinter Nights), or require an insanely high-end machine (Neverwinter Nights 2).

Storyline: astonishing, superb, extraordinary. It just doesn't get any better. Every character is rounded; every storyline is fulfilling; you have complete freedom while at the same time having a very definite agenda; combat is always purposeful rather than just mindless hacking-n-slashing. The game is bursting with atmosphere, wit, and challenges.

Graphics and sound: BG has a top-down 2D view, but with gorgeous, breathtaking hand-crafted environments. If you insist on 3D, this isn't the game for you; play Oblivion instead. ;-) Optimal screen resolution is 1024×768 for BG2 (you can't change resolution in BG1). Some of the voice-acting is top-notch. The music is very good – the combat music, in particular, is very fine indeed.

A suggestion: you may want to think about using the “Tutu” mod for playing BG1: this basically imports all game content from BG1 into the BG2 game engine, which allows you to make use of various options (character classes, screen resolution, 3D effects, etc.). On the other hand, you may decide that it makes BG1 a bit too easy.

This game is designed for an immersive, long-term experience, with 80–300 hours of gameplay. If you want something you can play for five minutes between phone calls, this isn't for you. Basically, this is the most lovingly-crafted game I have ever encountered; and this is the best edition of it.

I've had Baldur's gate 2 and its expansion for a while now. and decided to play through the game again.

Baldur's gate is nothing short of amazing. It presents an interesting storyline of high adventure, dealing with issues such as nasty dragons, strange murders in a town, a guild war, and even helping out a ‘fish’ king. Combat is fun, challenging and reasonably strategic. you can optionally tune the game to be turn based so you can spend as much time as you need to plan out attacks, reposition your party members, or even just to look at that new item you picked up a monster kill before :D This is all presented in a very detailed pre-rendered 2d world, which even today looks reasonably good. All of this comes together to build a level of immersion that a lot of RPG games since have failed to capture. In Total, both of the Baldur's gate and expansions should provide you with over 300 hours of top quality RPG fun. This is seriously Bioware in their element.

While this game is 10-odd years old, fear not about the game not running on modern hardware/operating systems. Baldur's gate 2 at least runs perfectly on Vista 64bit. There are modes to fix up how the game looks in widescreen mode, a mod to run Baldur's gate 1 on Baldur's gate 2 modified game engine. Ability to push the screen res up, etc.

Amazingly it still runs on Windows 7 just fine.

Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 have special places in my heart. I remember playing them when I was just a kid, and although I couldn't understand much of the story, the game itself wasn't too painful to wrap my head around and just dive in and have fun.

If I had my choice, when I have kids they'll be raised on games from the good old days when games weren't afraid to be complex, deep, and DIFFICULT. Be warned that the first few character levels of Baldur's Gate are tough, since almost everything other than Kobolds will make lunchmeat out of you. Have patience though, and you'll be rewarded with a big world to explore and many secrets to discover, in both games.

Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 are classic D&D videogames. The graphics may seem outdated now but they're not awful to look at and the story is certainly worth it.

Baldur's Gate 1 will let you go virtually anywhere, however that doesn't mean you'll survive going into areas where you shouldn't be. It generally involves a fair amount of running round trying to level up or dragging things back to sell but there are some mods available online that can change things a little or even make the silent companions a little more chatty. You don't have to play Baldur's Gate 1 to understand what is happening in Baldur's Gate 2, but it certainly helps.

Baldur's Gate 2 on the other hand is a lot less tedious in terms of running back and forth.The plot will drag you in, the companions will talk to your character and each other, and you have a variety of interesting places to explore. The Baldur's Gate 2 community is still thriving years after the game was released because of all the fan made mods available for this game. You'll be able to find tons that will allow you to replay this game over and over and over again.

It may be old, but it has aged well and with both the main games and expansions all in one relatively cheap bundle this is a purchase you shouldn't regret.

So much gaming for your money......and it is just quality! It will play on a netbook or almost anything. Maybe a 100+ hours of great fun for very little money. And yes it does play on Windows 7 64 bit no problems! Minsc says “Just buy it!”